We’re going to be seeing more stories like this popping up as more cities and try to legislate what we can eat when we dine out. From New Jersey:
Currently, the National Restaurant Association is working with members of Congress on a nationwide uniform standard. Therefore, the NJRA does not understand why New Jersey needs to rush to place another mandate on the restaurant industry. Note that menu labeling has proven not to work when mandated in other states or voluntarily provided by some restaurants. (emphasis added)
While this bill is targeted today at restaurant businesses with 15 or more units in New Jersey operating under the same name (certainly a reasonable dream for today’s entrepreneurs!), this is the first step towards requiring this expensive and ineffective mandate for all retail food establishments.
Legislating human behavior hasn’t been very successful, so why should this program be any different? The NJRA (New Jersey Restaurant Association) outlines their argument in four bullet points which are basically
- Menus are advertising, not PSAs
- Labeling increases risk of litigation
- Analyzing is costly and doesn’t change behavior
- Consumption + lifestyle is the real problem
It’s an interesting argument, and not one that we’ve heard yet.
